


this is where we are supposed to be

by besidemethewholedamntime



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Canon-Compliant, Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Mild Humour, Set during those four years in space
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-14
Updated: 2020-09-14
Packaged: 2021-03-07 07:15:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26469289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/besidemethewholedamntime/pseuds/besidemethewholedamntime
Summary: 'She sees Fitz’s eyes widen and open his mouth to retort, before deciding better of it. He can’t help the passive-aggressive smile, though, as he asks, “What did you want me for?”Jemma takes a deep breath to remind himself that he is sleep deprived too, and that while he is not the one who gave birth to Alya or feeds her every hour, he does change her and get up with her, walking the length of their bedroom with her pressed to his chest in order to let her mother sleep.Making sure Alya is settled, she says, “I think we need to give her a bath.”'It's time to give the baby a bath. Fitzsimmons try to overcome another hurdle of parenting and discover it's not as easy as first thought.
Relationships: Leo Fitz/Jemma Simmons
Comments: 26
Kudos: 74





	this is where we are supposed to be

**Author's Note:**

  * For [agentemaria4722](https://archiveofourown.org/users/agentemaria4722/gifts).



> Hello! This one really was meant to be a drabble, I promise, and I thought I wouldn't even get 800 words out of it and here we are... I can only apologise. Fitzsimmons trying to figure out how to bath a baby was just too good an idea to pass up and it got a bit away from me.
> 
> All thanks goes to agentemaria4722 who suggested an extended version of them trying to bath Alya that I mentioned in 'this love came back to me'. Thank you so much, this is for you!
> 
> Title is from 'Fortress' by Bear's Dean
> 
> I hope you enjoy it!

“Fitz?”

Jemma waits for beat but there’s no answer, and she cranes her neck to try and see where he might be, not wanting to shift too much and wake the sleeping baby in her arms. She frowns. For the past nine months he has been practically glued to her side, there every time she opened her eyes or turned around. How typical that now, when she would quite like him, he is nowhere to be found.

Sighing, and praying she doesn’t wake their daughter, she shouts, “Fitz!”

“What?” He yells back, running into their living room with a panicked look in his face. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

Alya suddenly begins to wail in protest at the combination of loud voices and thumping footsteps. Jemma huffs. “Great, now look at what you did. It took me an hour to get her to sleep.”

Fitz has the audacity to look affronted. “Me? What did I do? I wasn’t the one shouting.”

“Well I wouldn’t have _had_ to shout if you were here.”

“What so I’m not even allowed to go for a shower now without clearing it with you first?”

“Not when you’ve been hovering around me for months and then you just happen to disappear when I want you.”

“It’s not like it was deliberate!”

“No, just awfully convenient!”

“Alright!” Fitz yells with finality over Alya’s rising wails. “I’m sorry! I won’t leave your side without your express permission. Are you happy now?”

“Yes!” Jemma yells back, and then immediately turns her attention back to Alya, stroking her hot cheeks with her thumb. “Mummy’s sorry, sweet girl. Sometimes your Daddy can just be so infuriating.”

She sees Fitz’s eyes widen and he opens his mouth to retort, before deciding better of it. He can’t help the passive aggressive smile, though, as he asks, “What did you want me for?”

Jemma takes a deep breath to remind himself that he is sleep deprived too, and that while he is not the one who gave birth to Alya or feeds her every hour, he does change her and get up with her, walking the length of their bedroom with her pressed to his chest to give her mother a chance to sleep.

Making sure Alya is settled, she says, “I think we need to give her a bath.”

The panicked look that had just left Fitz’s face now returns. If anything, he looks even more afraid as he rubs the back of his neck. “Uh, do we need to do that so soon?”

“So soon? Fitz, she’s nearly two weeks old and-”

“Ten days,” he interrupts.

She rolls her eyes but doesn’t comment on it. “She’s ten days old, and I think it’s high time.” Jemma looks down at their Alya, who stares back up at her mother with her endlessly blue eyes that are so like her father’s. Lowering her voice slightly, she says, “She’s starting to smell.”

“Jemma!” He cries, aghast. “You can’t say that in front of her!”

“It’s true, though! We can’t lie to her about it, and it’s not as though she’s capable of creating long-term memories at the minute, anyway.”

“That’s not the point,” he tells her, coming across and gently taking Alya out of her arms. “Mummy didn’t mean that,” he coos, kissing her on the forehead. Then he stops and wrinkles his nose.

“Oh, Mummy might have had a point. A bath might be a very good idea.”

Jemma shifts uncomfortably on their sofa. Always a fast healer, she never expected to be still quite so _sore._ “I told you.”

“Is it safe?”

Her immediate response is to say _yes, of course,_ because why wouldn’t it be? But if the past ten days have taught her anything, it’s that babies come with all sorts of hidden levers and trapdoors and what usually seems perfectly safe can turn out to be completely dangerous. She’s a scientist, she prides herself on logic and reason, but all that is thrown out of the window when it comes to their daughter. She is completely irrational and utterly devoted. Her and Fitz have always been similar, but parenthood has really taken it to another level.

Chewing on her lip, she says, “I should think so. I can’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be.”

Fitz still looks unsure. It’s a little ironic, if one thinks of all the risks that he’s taken in his life, that he’s unwilling to risk submerging his daughter in a couple of centimetres of water. But Jemma knows him completely. He’d risk the world for Alya, but he wouldn’t risk Alya for the world.

“What about the book? Does it say anything in there?”

Enoch had managed to find her a book on (thankfully human) pregnancy from goodness-knows-where. During these last nine months the book has been their bible, and they, though especially Fitz, have consulted it for any and everything. Unfortunately, it only goes up to the actual birth, leaving everything that comes next to the reader’s imagination.

Jemma shakes her head and Fitz looks even more panicked. “What about Enoch?” He offers. “He’d know, or better yet he could do it.”

“Fitz,” she admonishes. “We cannot ask Enoch to bath our baby.”

“Why not? He’s probably got more experience with them than either of us.”

It’s a fair point. Both of them have no siblings and they left home at sixteen to work in a spy agency; neither of them has ever interacted much with children. All the same she bristles at it.

“He’s on a supply run anyway, so he won’t be back for a few days.” Still chewing on her lip, she appraises Fitz and Alya. “This time we truly are on our own.”

Fitz’s gulp is audible and his nervousness at the situation only serves to increase her own. They’re being ridiculous, she knows. They’ve managed to get this far, haven’t they? After everything they have gone through, bathing Alya should not be what makes them so afraid. However, alien viruses and the bottom of the ocean and snake-headed monsters have nothing on the power of a ten-day-old infant to induce fear into the hearts of her parents.

Shaking her head to clear it of the nonsense that comes with sleep deprivation, she starts to struggle to get out of the seemingly endless pile of cushions that all of a sudden she finds herself in. Fitz, without thinking, comes over to help her, holding Alya with one arm as he does. Jemma bites back a smile as she takes his offered arm. He’d been so nervous to hold Alya at first, refusing to move, barely even breathing whilst he did. Now he just does it, as if Alya is simply an extension of himself, something that has always belonged.

“Right,” Jemma says, matter-of-fact to disguise how nervous she is. If she lets Fitz see it then it will only spiral and the two of them will hold off for days, still just using a moist sponge, until Enoch returns and they beg him for his help. She likes to think they have a little more pride than that. Besides, what could possibly occur during this bath time that’s more terrifying than what they’ve already dealt with?

“We don’t have to do it right now,” Fitz says, both arms now back to cradling their daughter. “You look tired. Maybe you should sleep.”

She gives him an unimpressed look. “Nice try, but we should do it now before we lose our nerve.”

“Okay, fine. If we must.” Fitz looks around them before turning back to her. “Eh, what do we use to bath a baby?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she snaps. “We use- _oh._ ” She blinks, unfamiliar with the sensation that comes from being utterly blank. “I have no idea.”

They don’t have a bath on the Zephyr, a fact which she’s known for so long she’s never had to think about it before. The tiny sink they’ve been sponge-bathing Alya from is far too small, and not to mention the awkward angle it’s set at. Not for the first time she wishes she could call either of their parents, though in this case it wouldn’t do much good. Aside from the fact they now live in a different time, all of the conveniences of Earth are very far away for them to be of any help.

“Do we have a large container? Something that’s like a bath but, well, not?”

It must be the tiredness, but she thinks she can physically see Fitz’s brain try to think through all of the possessions they have on the Zephyr, indeed the only possessions they have in the whole world. He looks at her helplessly. “No, we don’t.”

Jemma closes her eyes, which is always a dangerous game with her exhausted state, and immediately opens them again. She tries to think back to when she was younger, when her cousin was born. She’d only been four at the time, and was more interested in how the baby had come about rather than the actual baby itself.

“We need a baby bath,” she says eventually. “Like a little plastic tub thing. It’s like a big bath but for babies and you fill it with water and-”

“Jemma,” Fitz says, raising his eyebrows, “slow down, alright? I know what you mean, but I don’t think we have anything like that.”

“Enoch didn’t-?”

Fitz gives her a _well what do you think_ look and she has to concede the point. During the last nine months Enoch has been almost as excited as the two of them, and his supply runs have been increasingly filled with baby paraphernalia, not all of it entirely useful. The things they find themselves actually needing now are not the things he had thought to buy, though neither of them can actually bring themselves to tell him that.

She runs a hand through her hair, which now that she thinks of it could really use a wash as well. She’s always been a neat and tidy person, always clean. When did she become so dirty? Fitz is standing across from her looking tired but also still the most handsome man she’s ever met and the thought usually fills her with joy, but now she’s just jealous. It seems so _unfair._

 _“_ Well what can we use then? There must be something, surely.”

Fitz gives a one-sided shrug. “I think we have a bucket somewhere…”

“ _A bucket?!”_ She doesn’t mean to be quite so loud, and Alya gives a mewl in protest. Lowering her voice and levelling a glare at Fitz, she says, “We are _not_ bathing our daughter in a _bucket.”_

 _“_ Why not? Pretty sure it’s what my mum did with me a couple of times when I was younger.” Then he stops and thinks, forehead creasing as he frowns. “Come to think of it she also put drops of whiskey in my bottle to get me to sleep.”

“That’s what you’ll be suggesting next if you think it’s okay to put her in a bucket!”

“I’m just saying we might want to consider it when-”

“Fitz!”

“Okay okay, no bucket. I’m sorry. If you just – I’ll – here, take her,” and he shifts Alya very gently back into Jemma’s arms. “Give me ten minutes, alright?”

“Where are you going?” She shouts after him as he begins to retreat, turning away from them to race back through the Zephyr.

“I’ll figure it out!” He yells over his shoulder as he goes. “Just trust me!”

“Always,” Jemma says reflexively, even though by now he’s too far away to hear.

It takes him significantly longer than ten minutes, but in the end he comes back with what looks like a metal bread basket, only around twice as long and three times as deep. It’s been cut from something else, but the rough edges have been sanded away and the whole thing has been polished until it gleams silver. Jemma can see her and Fitz’s reflection in its sides as they stand looking at it on their table.

“I know it’s not perfect,” Fitz says, rubbing the back of his neck. “And it won’t do as she gets bigger but for now…”

“It’s wonderful,” Jemma assures him, kissing him on the cheek. Fitz shoots her a look, and she knows he’s thinking _it’s just a metal tub_ but it’s so much more than that. Not for the first time does she think of how lucky she is to be with him, to have a family with him. He grins a little, and she wonders if perhaps he knows what she’s thinking, too.

The happy bubble in her chest bursts, however, when they realise that actually just locating a bathing device is not the first hurdle they have to jump. They have to figure out the best place to actually bathe her, then they have to figure out how to fill the thing and then, once they’ve filled it, they have to empty it because they’ve made it far too hot. Then they have to locate all of the baby toiletries that Enoch did manage to get, and then work out what each one is and does as the labels are all in different alien languages that neither one of them could hope to understand.

It’s nearly an hour later when they’re finally standing in front of it with Alya in Jemma’s arms, towels and toiletries ordered nearly beside their makeshift bath. Jemma and Fitz’s reflections in the shiny metal surface are a lot more haggard than they were an hour ago, and Jemma’s half tempted to call it quits and just try again tomorrow.

“You ready?” Fitz asks.

She nods, swallowing past the lump in her throat that’s suddenly come from nowhere. Baby’s first bath shouldn’t be such an emotional moment. “As I’ll ever be.”

“Alright then.” Fitz checks the temperature of the water one more time and nods to her.

“Are you ready for your first bath, sweet girl?” Jemma coos to Alya, who kicks out happily at the sound of her mother’s voice. “Yes? Okay then, let’s get you in.”

With steady hands she begins to lower Alya into the water, torn between being too scared to even blink, and an urge to suddenly shut her eyes until it’s all over.

Fitz hovers anxiously half a step behind her. “You’ve got her securely, yeah? Her head, Jemma. You’ve got her head?”

“I have her head, Fitz,” Jemma says in a sing-song tone for Alya’s benefit, but with just a hint of a murderous undertone. One of them really needs to be level-headed right now, and Jemma doesn’t think it should be the one who’s still flooded with hormones.

“Okay, okay,” he says, but she can hear him shuffling. He steps away and then back again. “You’re still watching her head, right?”

“Enough,” Jemma decides, bringing Alya up out of the bathtub and holding her out to Fitz. “If you so concerned with the way I’m doing it then you can do it.”

In an instant he turns paler than she would have thought possible. “Oh, I- uh, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“No, really, please,” she says, giving him a bitter smile. “Go ahead.”

She won’t give this one up and she knows he knows it, and with an audible gulp he gently takes a now squirmy Alya from her before stepping up to the bathtub.

“Hey there, sweetheart,” he says softly, as their daughter stares up at him. “Shall we get you in the water? It’s all lovely and warm and-”

Fitz babbles away to her softly as he lowers her in. Both parents hold their breath as the warm water washes over their daughter’s skin for the first time. A multitude of emotions pass through Jemma’s chest and she’s suddenly so afraid even though she doesn’t understand why.

Alya, for her part, looks only mildly startled at this new sensation. She draws her eyebrows together as if trying to figure out what it could possibly be, looking up at her father, wide-eyed and full of wonder. After a few seconds she is kicking her legs and arms out, splashing herself and Fitz.

Jemma smiles. “She likes it.”

Fitz doesn’t take his eyes from Alya. “Uh-huh.”

Something in his voice has Jemma peering at his face and even though Alya is in the water and clearly loving it, he still looks as terrified as he did when a bath was first suggested.

“She’s fine,” Jemma says softly, placing a soothing hand on his arm. “Look at her; she’s having a blast.”

“It’s just… she’s so _small,_ ” he chokes out.

Jemma can see what he means. Alya is a tiny little thing, even without any baby experience they know it, but now she looks even smaller, as though she’s growing backwards in the ten days she’s been in the world.

Just then Alya gives a mighty kick which has water sloshing over Fitz’s arm and all up his shirt. He gives a shocked gasp and says, “Oh you are a cheeky little monkey, aren’t you? Yes you are.” And then he grins. Alya gives a short smile, and even though Jemma knows that her smiles are mostly reflexive at this point, she could swear that she was smiling with Fitz.

“She’s small, but she’s fierce,” Jemma comments, and Fitz shoots her a quick look. Even though he’s clearly still anxious, he also looks so radiantly happy. During the time they have been together, just the two and now three of them, ever since they have put their plans for saving the world on pause, he has looked so much younger and so much lighter and just so much _happier._ The way he smiles now, the sparkle in his eyes, everything they’re doing seems worth it just to see that.

Considering the trouble they went through in the beginning, the rest of the bath goes far more smoothly. They work in tandem, Fitz holding Alya and gently rinsing her whilst Jemma does the washing. Alya almost falls asleep whilst her hair is being shampooed, but she frowns, deeply displeased, when being washed underneath her chin. When they scoop her out of the cooling water she lets out a high, thin wail as if to say that she would have liked some more time.

“She’s quite the little water baby, isn’t she? Bet she’ll be swimming around in there before too long,” Fitz says as he wraps Alya in a fluffy white towel that has a slightly wobbly monkey embroidered into the corner of it. Unable to sleep one night near the end of her pregnancy, Fitz had set his mind to do it and had been immensely proud to present it to her in the morning.

“Yes,” Jemma says, but even to herself her voice sounds far away, and an ache comes from somewhere and settles into her chest, making it hard to breathe.

The ache is there as they powder, moisturise and put Alya into her pyjamas. It makes it hard to breathe as Jemma feeds her, and looking down into her small face, she realises that she can’t make it out for the tears in her eyes. She’s unable to concentrate on anything else other than this pain in the centre of her chest and when Alya is put, dozing, into her cradle, both parents standing over her, Jemma feels it so acutely that she can’t imagine ever not feeling it ever again.

“Jemma?”

She turns from looking at Alya, so perfectly adorable in her white baby-grow and knitted hat, to Fitz, whose concern-filled eyes look at her imploringly. He gently lays a hand on hers where it rests on the side of the cradle.

“What’s wrong?”

The softness in his tone has tears springing to her eyes immediately. _Bloody hormones._ She bites her lip, not wanting to spoil the moment. “Nothing.”

“Jemma…” He tilts his head, raising one eyebrow. “Come on.” His thumb makes gentle sweeping motions over her hand, calming her heart, easing the ache. “What is it?”

“Do you…” A fat tear spills out onto her cheek and with his free hand he wipes it away, impossibly soft. “Do you ever feel like we’re making a mistake, living like this?”

Fitz’s answer is soft but quick, an immediate syllable. “No.”

“Really?” She asks in disbelief. It was him who first said that they take some time, that they just live for a little while before having to risk their lives again, but things are different now. Alya, who for so many months was a wish, a hope, is now a whole little person who is as magnificent as the star she is named for. Raising her on a Zephyr is now a reality as opposed to the distant future plan it was before.

“Yeah, really,” he says, voice low.

“But what about the things she won’t experience for years? We’re keeping her away from a whole world, Fitz. A whole entire world.” She looks up at him, his face slightly smeared through her tears. “We’re missing out on so much.”

“And if we were spending all our time building a time machine and finishing our plans then we’d still be missing out, just on something more important.” He moves closer to her, even though he was already quite close before.

“We might not be getting to take her swimming just yet, or going to the park or showing off how cute she is to our parents-” Jemma chuckles at that and Fitz gives a soft, relieved smile “-but we’ve got _her._ And she has us. And that’s so much more important than anything else right now.”

He’s right. Of course he’s right. And if Fitz were the one having doubts right now then it’s exactly what she would say to him. Even after all these years their psychic link still holds up.

“One day we’ll have to go back,” he continues. “I know that. We’ll have to finish what we started. But for now…”

“Let’s just enjoy this time we have together,” Jemma finishes, and the smile he gives her feels a lot like coming home.

“Yeah,” he says softly, and for a moment he looks like he did all those years ago, illuminated in the rays of a new beginning. “Let’s just do that.”

They both look away from each other then, irresistibly drawn to their sleeping daughter. Every inch of her is perfect. Her ten tiny fingers and her ten tiny toes. Her impossibly long lashes and her little dimples that peek through every so often. All perfect. Jemma has done so many great things in her life, has accomplished all that she wanted to and more, and yet the greatest of these is Alya, of that she has no doubt.

“It was worth it,” she says quietly, into the soft silence that has settled between them. “Everything we’ve done to get here. It’s all worth it.”

Fitz nods, reaching out to gently brush Alya’s cheek. “Definitely. I’d do it all again.”

“Me too,” Jemma says, and then wrinkles her nose, able to now that the ache in her chest has fallen away. “Even that excruciating labour.”

She’s able to joke about it now, but at the time it had been terrifying. It had been so long and she had been in so much pain, and Fitz had valiantly smoothed her hair and kept her calm, even though she knew that he was panicking completely. At the time it had seemed like nothing could be worth that hurt, and then there was Alya and she had thought _oh, you are._

“Ah, yeah.” Fits looks only mildly uncomfortable. “Enoch was a pretty good midwife, wasn’t he?”

“Not as good as you,” she assures him, kissing him on the cheek. “I was so proud of you. You didn’t faint or anything.”

He gives her a withering look. “Would have been a bit pathetic if I had. You were going through all of _that._ I just had to hold you.” He smiles. They both know he did more than that. “Though it was disgusting.”

Making a face, she says, “It really was, wasn’t it? But she was beautiful.”

“She was,” he agrees, the corner of his eyes creasing with his smile. “Absolutely. Still don’t understand it. I thought they were meant to look like wrinkly potatoes when they’re born.”

Jemma hums in thought. “I think it’s different when it’s your own. To everyone else maybe she would have looked like a wrinkly potato.”

“Nah.” He shakes his head emphatically. “Not possible. She’s always been gorgeous.”

Ten days old and Alya already has him wrapped completely around her tiny finger. “Fitz…”

“What?” There are stars right at this moment outside their window, but they’ve got nothing on the twinkle in his eye. “Are you going to say that she wasn’t?”

Well of course she isn’t, because she knows as well as he does that their baby would outshine all other babies in a heartbeat. “No, I suppose I’m not. She really was the most gorgeous.”

Fitz keeps smiling at her as he slings an arm around her shoulder in a gesture that’s become habit as of late. Kissing her on the side of her hair, he whispers, “We made a good one, didn’t we?”

“Yes,” she whispers back, unable to help the smile on her face or the soft laugh that comes bubbling from her chest in the place where the ache used to be. “Of course we did.”

He looks at her as though she is his very favourite thing, which she knows is untrue because his most favourite thing lies innocently asleep before them. It’s amazing, Jemma thinks, how quickly such a little person becomes absolutely everything to you.

Fitz is right. They have each other and, above all else, they have Alya. Right now, there is nothing more important than that.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading - I hope you enjoyed this! Please feel free to leave kudos/comments. Please feel free not to. Either way, I hope you have a lovely day and are managing to stay safe and well <3


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